Local & General News.

Feilding Star, Volume IV, Issue 6, 23 June 1883, Page 2

Local & General News.

• The Midwinter holidays for the Feilding State School commenced yesterday. Mr Proctor, the astronomer, talks of making another tour through the niesThe railway line will be opened as far as Manutahi in about a month, when very material improvements will be mad c in the running of trains. The latter sentence in the paragraph published in our last issue referring to the steamer Napier making trips to Rangitikei should have read, "It is probable that a company will be started to purchase a boat for the trade with Bulls." Tbe new railway bridge over the Rangitikei River at Kakariki is now so far complete that locomotives were sent over it yesterday for the first time. On Monday next the ordinary traffic will be resumed. Judge Wilson has entered into an agreement with a Tauranga Company to work the sulphur of White Island, the capital to be £10.000. It was considered that the premises a : ready erected at Tauranga would manufacture 1,300 tons of chamber acid in the year. The street lamps, which have been made and placed in position by Mr P. Thompson, of Manchester st., are generally approved of, and were spoken of in the Council meeting on Thursday evening as very creditably got up. They were lighted last night for the first time. The glorious mid-wiuter weather of the past few days has been such as to strike admiration into some of the recent arrivals from Home of the mildness of our climate as compared with that often experienced in the Old Country in the winter season. An advertisemnt appears elsewhere from Mr Bauekhara decorator, coach painter, and sign writer.- As the specimens of workmanship of Mr Bauckham may already be seen in various parts of the town and district, it needs no recommendation from us. Our local butchers in Manchester st. had a magnificent show in their respective shops last evening. The beef, mutton, and pork was tempting, and would prove an almost irresistiole attraction to the most fastidious. The display of small goods was also very fine. Mr Cottre'l, of Manchester street, has just received and opened up a stock of general grocery goods. The samples we have seen are apparently of very good quality, and Mr Cottrell, we believe, is disposing of the goods at such prices as will ensure him customers. A detailed announcement will appear in our columns next week. We regret to learn that Mr Geo. Kidd, of Kiwitea, who was thrown from his horse some days ago, is now suffering severely from the consequences of the accident. Dr Johnston, who is in attendance on the patient, has found it necessary to exhibit strong opiates to afford relief from the intense suffering experienced by Mr Kidd. For a long while past (writes a correspondent of the Press) a strong smell of kerosene has been noticed in some of the waterraces between Charleston and Fox's on the Wast Coast. Suspecting the presence of a petroleum spring in the vicinity, an American gentleman of large experience has gone there, with a view to test the nature of this exudation. As will be seen by advertisement in another column, tenders are invited for protective works near the Kiwitea Bridge, Kimbolton-road, and also at the Makino Bridge, Manchester- street Plans and specifications may be seen at the Borough Council Office, and the tenders must be in by 4 o'clock next Wednesday afternoon. VVe are glad to find the Council has at last taken action on those two most important works. An absurd superstition prevails that the bites of all dogs should be either cut or cauterised, and the poor animal destroyed. It is not necessary to adopt either of these serious courses provided the dog is healthy. In fact, they are simply ridiculous, and are calculated to pro* i uee groundless fears in the person bitten. Of course, in severe cases erysipelas may supervene, but with ordinary care, the wound being cleansed by a disinfecting lotion, no serious consequences will follow. In all cases, however, a doctor should be consulted. — Lancet. A meeting of the Feilding School Committee was held at the school house last evening. Present — J. C. Thompson, chairman; T. W. K. Foster, secretary; and Messrs Watts, Bray, Towler and Worsfold. The minutes of the previous meeting were read and confirmed. Correspondence was read from the Education Board declining to erect tbe school bell. The petition from certain residents to the Wanganui Board was returned to the Board. Mrs Dowling's resignation ■was received * and- accepted.' Another meeting will be held this evnipg, when some routine work will be completed.. It was decided to call for tenders for erecting a bell for the school.

The total value of insurances in Feild-in-f now pledged to make an effort to break the present monopoly of Insurance ■ oinpanies amounts to-day to £26,000. Tyndall says that men and women existed on this earth 50,000,0 0 years before the date <?f Adam and Eve. This is a statement which we are not prepared to contradict. The Wellington Post says : — " All we hope is tbat the Ministry may not be induced, from considerations of their own safety, to depart from the modest programme sketched out in the Goyernor's speech. Central Queensland is composed of a vast plateau, comprising 170,000,000 acres, an almost unbroken tract of fine sheep country, by far the most extensive and even expanse of pastoral land in Australia. When the whole is fully occupied it will be capable of carrying 50,000,000 sheep. An American paper says, that so numerous is the company in some of the inns in the vicinity of the White Mountains, that at night they place travellers on the floor in rows till they got to sleep, then set them up against the wall and lay down another lot, and so on till all are accommodated. As some of those persons who were interested in the two petitions presented to the Borough Council on Thursday, may possibly wonder wby no action was taken 1 m the matter, we may explain that according to the Borough bye-laws, no petition can be discussed until the next ordinary meeting following that on which they are presented. ! It is due to Mrs Caldwell, mother of the young man who met with the sad accident reported elsewhere, that in order to prevent disappointment she bore up sufficiently to act as an accompanist at | the concert on 1 hursday evening. Moreover, she was making a temporary stay in town, and did not learn the full particulars of the accident till the next morning. Sir George Grey has singular ideas on the subject of liberality towards the taxburdened " down trodden serfs" of the Colony. He is about to introduce a Bill to exempt charitable gifts from legacy duty. This said legacy duty relieves the "serfs" a little, and ought to be allowed to remain. All so-called " charitable bequests" are genera-Iy so skilfully handled that only a chosen few benefit by them.